Brunel’s Momentum: Strategy update for post-Covid profitable growth acceleration and the next phase of development

Amsterdam, 31 March 2021 – Today at its first-ever Capital Markets Event, Brunel International N.V. (Brunel; BRNL), a global provider of flexible specialist workforce solutions, will present an update on its strategy and growth plans for the period 2021 - 2025.

Highlights Strategy Update 2021 – 2025

• Brunel enters the next phase of development with a leaner and more disciplined organization providing for enhanced operating leverage
  
  
• Well-positioned to take advantage of post-Covid market momentum with increased demand for specialists and engineering solutions for a more sustainable world
  
  
• New growth strategy based on four value drivers: (i) Diversification; (ii) Specialization; (iii) Capability building; (iv) Disciplined execution; enabled by a global operational steering model and further accelerated through M&A
  
  
• Matched capital allocation plan with a dividend policy revised upwards to 60-100% pay-out
  
  
• New set of medium term objectives and key metrics introduced to underline ambition, track strategic progress and performance delivery

Jilko Andringa, CEO of Brunel International N.V.: “For Brunel we now see several things coming together at the same time. There will be a post-Covid market recovery and new momentum for change with the digital and energy transition significantly gaining traction across many of the global industries we serve. Investment planning by clients in key markets such as renewables, future mobility, oil & gas and life sciences is starting to ramp up again. All these developments imply an ever greater need for engineers and engineering solutions in the years to come. Given our pool of more than 12,000 skilled specialists combined with our global network, we are uniquely positioned to benefit from these trends as we are on the verge of our next phase of development.

Over the past few years, our team has worked hard to lay the foundation for this next phase. We have established a leaner, more agile and disciplined organization. 2020 was in fact an unexpected but successfully passed test for this. It demonstrated our enhanced operating leverage and showed that we were able to protect our margins by trimming down our cost base faster than our revenue decline.

With the fundamental and ongoing shift to a more sustainable world, the new market momentum and our more agile organization in place, this is the right time for us to gear up our strategy, accelerate our growth and margin expansion. We believe our prospects for the years to come are better than ever. Our new medium term objectives underline our ambitions to create a better and more sustainable future for our clients and our professionals and demonstrate the potential of Brunel’s unique and future-proof business model.”

Upward revision dividend policy
In line with our updated strategy and capital allocation plan, the dividend policy has been revised upward with the intention to distribute 60%-100% (prior: 30%-100%) of earnings per share as dividend.

New medium term objectives and key metrics
We have set new financial and non-financial objectives and will apply the following key metrics to track our performance in this next phase of development:

Financial objectives
Revenue:  Gross margin: Revenue per FTE: EBIT as % of gross profit: EBIT margin:	high single-digit year-on-year growth (as of 2022) year-on-year increase in each (reporting) region year-on-year increase of billing rates conversation rate of 30% or higher in 2025 group EBIT >6% in 2025

Non-financial objectives
Specialist pool: Engagement: Specialist retention: Carbon footprint: SDG’s:	>15,000 connected specialists in 2025 client, contractor and staff NPS score of > +25 year-on-year average retention rate improvement of 1 month committed to deliver on UN’s zero emission plan continued commitment to UN SDG’s 4, 5, 7, 10, 12 and 14

Guidance
The outlook for Q1 2021 as provided at the publication of our full year results 2020 in February remains unchanged: year on year a lower revenue, at slightly higher gross margins (%) and significantly lower cost, resulting in an EBIT similar to Q1 2020.

Supervisory Board
Just Spee will become chairman of the Supervisory Board, succeeding Aat Schouwenaar.

Capital Markets Event and Live Webcast
Today at 15:00 CET Brunel will host a Capital Markets Event at which it will present and discuss the strategy update. You can watch the event through a real-time webcast. The presentations and a replay of the webcast will be made available on our website: www.brunelinternational.net

Attachment

Press Release - CMD and strategy update